Murder at Fenway Park:. Troy Soos

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      Chapter Four

      My new teammates milled about home plate, coordinating their moves so that each time I tried to step to the batter’s box I was blocked out. This came as no surprise; preventing rookies from taking a turn at batting practice is a standard part of the hazing ritual new ball players have to endure. For form’s sake, I maintained a pretense of expecting a chance to hit, but I really didn’t mind when other players elbowed in front of me and stepped to the plate. I was engrossed in scanning the Hilltop Park stands. This was the first time I’d been in a stadium as a player where I used to come as a spectator.

      The grandstand behind third base was filling up with fans: office clerks taking an afternoon off to attend a nonexistent aunt’s funeral, and courting couples who sat high in the stands to enjoy the view of the Jersey Palisades across the Hudson River.

      Outside the right field foul line lay the open bleacher seats, bare pine boards occupied mostly by kids who couldn’t afford better vantage points. Less than ten years ago, I was one of those eager faces dreaming of actually being on this field some day.

      Box seats between home plate and the dugouts held middle-aged men in business suits and derbies who looked as if they could afford the best. I had never been able to get a ticket for one of those seats, and gloated that today I would be sitting in an even better location: the dugout bench.

      Everywhere, the ballpark was alive with sounds that had been dormant all winter and now burst out with the coming of April. From a hundred directions came the sociable buzz of friendly arguments—about off-season trades, which teams would make it to the World Series, which players were over the hill and which were promising rookies. Over the chatter, vendors barked Peanuts! and Beer! and fans shouted their orders for same. From the field came the sharpest sounds: loud cracks of wood on leather as hitters teed off on soft tosses from the batting practice pitcher; and hard pops of leather on leather, as baseballs were thrown into mitts eager to snap them up.

      Ten minutes to game time, Jake Stahl called us in to the dugout. Contrary to what Bob Tyler predicted, Stahl had decided not to start me. He said he’d let me get adjusted to the team before putting me in the lineup. I wondered if he was also letting me recover from the episode in Fenway Park, but he said nothing about it.

      I sat by myself at the end of the dugout bench. I knew the first rule for rookies: they should be seen and not heard. I also knew the second rule: they shouldn’t be seen either. To my teammates I had as little stature as a batboy. It would take a while for me to be accepted by them. Usually the way it worked was that a rookie would be paired with a veteran player on road trips. After the veteran showed the youngster around and gave his approval, the other players would start to think of him as part of the team, too. My roommate was to be Clyde Fletcher, another utility player, but only his luggage made it to our hotel room last night so we had yet to meet.

      The game got under way with Harry Hooper leading off for us against Hippo Vaughn. The Highlander pitcher looked as huge as his name implied, but I thought he was more imposing in appearance than he was in performance (of course it’s always easy to think that from a safe spot in the dugout or the bleachers). Hooper had no trouble with him, lining a single back through the box on the second pitch.

      While the next batters took their turns, I fixed my attention on Hal Chase at first base. I was oddly comforted by his presence there. Not because it was Chase—famed equally for his fielding prowess and his unsavory character—but because he was a player I had watched as a boy in this very ballpark. When I was a kid, sitting in the bleachers and fantasizing about playing in the big leagues, I always envisioned in my daydreams playing against the very players who were on the field in the very ballparks where I watched them. Those players had been leaving the game, though, and huge new stadiums were replacing the homey ones I used to know. So it was with a feeling of comfortable familiarity that I sat in old Hilltop Park, reassured to see Hal Chase manning first base for the Highlanders.

      Six and a half innings went by with the Sox hitters methodically driving singles and doubles off of Vaughn and circling the bases for seven runs. Our pitcher, Bucky O’Brien, just as methodically mowed down the New York batters, holding them scoreless with only two hits. Already some fans were crossing the corner of the outfield to get to the exit gate in the right field fence. It seemed odd to see people walking through fair territory while a game was in progress, but it was one of the quaint facts of life at Hilltop Park.

      “Rawlings! You come here to sleep or play ball?”

      I looked up at the angry voice. “Huh?”

      Stahl was standing in front of me, clutching his mitt in one hand and pointing toward the infield with the other. “I said you’re playing second. Get out there! We’re not paying you to sit on your ass.”

      I snatched my glove and stumbled out of the dugout, running to second base. Jake followed close on my heels to take his position at first. O’Brien threw his last warm-up pitch, and the Highlander leadoff man stepped into the batter’s box. I was now officially in my first Red Sox game. Stahl must have figured that with a 7–0 score it was safe to put me in.

      I was a tight bundle of nerves anyway. To settle down, I went over the fundamentals: if it’s a grounder to me, I throw to Stahl at first ... a bunt toward first, I cover the bag ... a hit to right field, I move out for the cutoff throw ... a drive to left, I cover second.

      None of these situations developed, as O’Brien struck out the first two batters and the third flied out to center. I jauntily trotted off the field, having accomplished nothing but feeling satisfied at having done nothing wrong.

      I didn’t get a turn at bat in the top of the eighth, as our side went down in order. In the bottom half, my first fielding chance came as Hal Chase himself hit an easy one-hopper to me. I played it cleanly, and felt my confidence grow.

      I was due up fourth in the final frame, so I wasn’t sure if I’d get to bat at all. Tris Speaker then led off the inning with his second double of the game and my chances improved. Speaker moved to third base on a fielder’s choice, and I moved to the on-deck circle. I swung two bats together to loosen up. They weren’t my usual bats, but new ones that I bought in a sporting goods store earlier in the day. The short stubby pieces of wood had roughly the same heft as the homemade bats I’d left in my hotel room.

      Stahl struck out looking, and I approached the batter’s box slowly. As nervous as I first was in the field, I was more so coming to the plate. At second base there was always a chance that I wouldn’t be involved in a play, but in the batter’s box there was no place to hide. It would be just Hippo and me.

      I took my place in the box, kicking my right spike into the dirt. When facing a pitcher he hasn’t seen before, a hitter will usually take the first pitch looking. But I didn’t like to let good ones go by, so I would choose one spot and one type of pitch, and if it was served there, I’d take a rip at it. I now tried to pick a location for the first pitch, but absolutely nothing came to mind. While I frantically tried to think of the pitch I wanted to look for, I unconsciously СКАЧАТЬ